Applications of modeling and simulation forpredictions of the splat morphology under APSprocess conditions

This work describes the numerical investigation of the impact of single molten partially yttria-stabilized zirconia (PYSZ) particle droplets on flat substrate surfaces with different temperatures under plasma spraying conditions. The main focus of this study was to provide a better understanding of complicated physical phenomena, such as particle impact, cooling and solidification on the substrate. The results of the numerical simulations show how the substrate properties, particularly the temperature, influence the particle solidification and spreading behaviour as well as the resulting morphology of the fully solidified particle. The simulations were performed using a computational fluid dynamics program; for the tracing of the free surfaces the volume of fluid method (VoF) was used. In this study, particle droplets of 30 µm diameter impacted with 180 m/s on the substrate surface with varied temperature. Different splat morphologies, spreading factor and splashing of the splats during impact were compared and discussed.